The World as I Found It

by Bruce Duffy

  Russell was painfully aware of the irony that he should be writing The Conquest of Happiness at a time when he was feeling exceedingly thwarted and unhappy. That, he thought, was one of the disorienting things about writing, to be describing or analyzing emotions that one was not then experiencing. Russell certainly thought he had been happy far more than he had been unhappy, yet he had experienced little of what might be called joy. In his ruminations about the book, and in his general unhappiness, Russell had been trying to remember not just the times of happiness in his life, which had been many, but times of joy. Real, not figurative, joy. Not passion or triumph, or even boundless love, but pure splashing, beaming, unqualified joy. And Russell could think of but one instance: fatherhood. Indeed, fatherhood seemed the one bright spot in his life now that his second marriage was foundering.

  Miss Marmer, one of the teachers at Beacon Hill, was not a joy or even an especially bright spot in his life, but she did offer harbor of a kind. Miss Marmer was very understanding about these things. Best of all, Miss Marmer was also discreet and undemanding, with no apparent expectation of anything more lasting. Of late, Russell had been seeing more of Miss Marmer, what with Dora shutting him out of their room. Not that Russell wanted in, especially; it was more a matter of principle, or rather a battle of wills, with Russell wanting in expressly because Dora had shut him out. To be still more precise, Russell wanted out the man who then was living inside his wife’s room, the man who was consoling her and, as he sometimes thought, plotting with her against him. Higgins was an American, and he was no stranger to Beacon Hill, having lived there all the previous September while the headmaster had been away in America. Higgins had seen after things in Russell’s absence. As a matter of fact, Higgins had fathered the child that Dora was soon to deliver.

  Sometimes, while walking with his son John on the nearby chalk bluffs, in the sharp sea wind, Russell would say, Strong men seek the mountains; wise men of virtue seek the sea. And John, a bright and inquisitive boy, with a snarl of dark hair, would ask, Which do you seek, Daddy? And Russell, beaming down at his beautiful bark of a boy would reply, I seek both of course, saying this with all the self-sufficiency of fatherhood, as if he were the same man at all times. But at night, cut off from Dora and feeling neither strong nor wise nor fatherly, Russell would find himself seeking something else. Miss Marmer had become a regular harbor then, as a matter of fact.

  The Innocent

  SUCH WAS THE SITUATION that morning as Moore and Dorothy were hurrying down the platform to meet Wittgenstein. Or rather, this was the situation until the Moores saw a large, rough-looking man barge excitedly over to Wittgenstein. The man’s face was heated, his back was broad, and he was gesticulating emphatically. Dressed in canvas shorts and sandals and an open white shirt with rolled sleeves, he was smiling and spreading his big arms, nudging Wittgenstein with a gaping tale he seemed to be gathering out of his chest, his voice resounding over the station din like the cadenced woofs of a bow saw.

  For a moment then, Moore thought — or wanly hoped — that this human spectacle was someone Wittgenstein had run into at the station. But, no: Wittgenstein seemed to know this man, whose story he was following with deep, if uneasy, attention, all the while tapping his slender cane.

  But who’s that, Bill? whispered Dorothy, sidling up to him. You never said he was bringing a friend.

  Well, if he is, muttered Moore indignantly, it’s certainly news to me.

  With that, there was the flurried press of greetings and introductions. Wittgenstein was saying hello to Dorothy, whom he had met only once briefly, before the war, and Moore was paying the porter, who was staring at the vagabond pack and roll at the big man’s feet. Pointing to a corrugated cylinder with leather straps that hung from the pack, the porter said to him, That there — that’s a Heinie gas mask case, id’nit? From the war.

  Beaming with a broad punch of a face, the big man said, Sure. That is so, brother.

  The porter went white at the sound of the man’s heavy German accent and said quickly, Didn’t mean nothing by it, mate — by Heinie, I mean.

  The other man shrugged affably. In it I keep only food now.

  The porter looked puzzled. The German wasn’t much past thirty — young to have been in the war. He said, You was in it, were you?

  The German nodded. Arras. Verdun. Then the Somme, and wounded bad. Then here in the prison camp two years.

  Sorry ’bout that, mate, said the porter, with a troubled look. A bad time, that was. A better time for you in England this trip, eh? He turned to Moore respectfully. Begging your pardon, sir, mum. For my interrupting, I mean. I was just very surprised, is all.

  The German threw up an easy hand. God keep you.

  Said the gaping porter, easing off, You, too, mate.

  With a look of discomfort, Wittgenstein resumed his introductions. This is my close friend Max Einer. Max and I met in Austria after the war. He arrived unexpectedly last night, and I wonder if you would mind if he came with us. I thought Russell would have room. Max is not fussy about where he sleeps, and he will make himself useful. There are always jobs to be done at a school.

  Sure, agreed Max. Anywhere I sleep, he said, pointing to the pack.

  Well, said Moore in a laboring voice. It’s certainly fine with me if Mr. Einer comes, but of course I can’t speak for Mr. Russell.

  Oh, said Max offhandedly. This Russell and I, we will be fine, Moore. Always, Ludwig tells me about you, Moore, and also this Russell. Always I told him I will meet you. So this is gut. And this nice lady, he said, gesturing to Dorothy. This is your wife, Moore?

  Moore, unnerved by his astonishing forwardness, said protectively, This is Mrs. Moore, yes.

  Dorothy Moore, she added, offering an uncertain hand.

  Oh, Dorthe! said Max knowingly, with a loutish grin. Boyishly then, as if he had known her for years, Max gave her plump arm a squeeze, then looked around happily now that all was settled. And after that Max called her Dorthe, just as he called Moore Moore.

  And Max did make himself useful. With Max there was no need for a porter. And with the likes of Max barging down the crowded aisle with two armloads of luggage, they had absolutely no trouble finding good seats.

  And he was charming, if not bewildering, in his way. It was not from uncouthness that Max so quickly assumed familiarity with everyone, it was rather a matter of intense belief. By Max’s book, no man had hegemony over another. Max detested convention, pretense and falseness of any kind. He ate with whatever spoon was nearest and spoke his mind, no matter who was present or what it cost him. In court once, after a brawl in which Max had beaten three men unconscious, the magistrate sentenced him to three days more in jail for refusing to address him as Your Honor. The magistrate lectured and threatened, but Max was recalcitrant: he took those three days in jail, then six days more for his continued stubbornness. Max would have been jailed a thousand times had not the local priest interceded. This was in Trattenbach, toward the end. Having long acted as Wittgenstein’s apologist and defender, Max never flagged in what he saw as his duty to his best friend on earth. Once released, Max found those three and gave them another pounding for other ugly tales they had spread. But he didn’t stop there. Down by the tavern, bloody and enraged, he battered down a door and beat two other men senseless, then with loud oaths dragged them into the street, daring anyone to utter another word against him or his friend. In his way, Max considered himself a man of the Gospels, a friar of sorts.

  There was an extraordinarily healthy, unkillable presence about Max. On one thigh was a red scald from the flame throwers his shock battalion had used in the war. A bullet had gone clean through the meat of his other thigh, and shrapnel had torn a bite from his left calf. There were mustard gas burns on his back and his left ear was as nicked and crumpled as a tomcat’s where shrapnel had shredded it.

  Now, other passengers were looking over their magazines at the garrulous German. Children stood on their seats to stare at him. The
warm air sweeping in through the window carried his smell, causing those nearby to stir nervously in their berths like horses who had caught scent of a bear. It was a faintly vinegary and beery smell, mixed with the scent of the cheap talc used by the barber that Wittgenstein had taken him to that morning to get him cleaned up for the trip. How do you want it? the barber had asked. Short, said the indifferent Max, who carried no comb but his hand. The barber had not been able to keep him still, and as a result, Max’s thick brown hair had been clipped short and erratically. With his long broken nose and little creased, predatory eyes, finely etched and crinkled about the edges with fist cuts, he looked like one of Dürer’s stony peasants. For Moore and Dorothy facing him, he was a little too close. His seat creaked with him; he was like a bucket threatening to slop over, uncontainable. They saw dirt caked under his toenails. His legs were hairy and heavily muscled, and his ankles were scratched with thistles. Alarming, too, was that aggressive bulge in his crotch, his thighs spread wide to the world — of this, Max seemed as open and unaware as an animal of its own steeping sex. Huddled beside him, subtle and watchful, Wittgenstein seemed almost birdlike.

  At first, Dorothy Moore couldn’t quite picture them together. And yet there was an unspoken intimacy between them, as if their separate oddities had knitted together over the years like a human island, populated with its own peculiar flora and fauna. Wittgenstein was distinctly uneasy; each time Max opened his mouth he seemed afraid of an upset. They were about an hour outside of London, the train having fallen into a comfortable shipboard rocking as they passed plump, loaflike hills, narrow sweeps of forest and fields scattered with dirty gray balls that, on second glance, one realized were sheep. They were talking about Russell’s school. Dorothy Moore was slowly brushing the underside of her chin with her finger. Comfortably curled into herself in her chaise, handsome and suitably older, she was like a plump cat. I understand you taught school yourself, Mr. Wittgenstein, she said. How old were the children you taught?

  She saw Wittgenstein’s eyes focused on her, piercing, like pencils. Slowly he was rubbing his pressed hands together, saying, They ranged in age from eight to thirteen. Peasant children, very poor. The village was barely a big ditch. This, you see, was where Max and I met.

  Ah, said Moore, nodding. It seemed now that he could connect them.

  Dorothy remarked, Isn’t that interesting, though. That you and Mr. Russell — philosophers — would spend years teaching children.

  I did not turn to it from philosophical interest, said Wittgenstein abruptly. On the contrary, my aim was to turn completely away from philosophy. Not wishing to seem overly harsh, Wittgenstein ventured a smile, adding, But I understand what you mean. It amuses me too that Russell should himself be teaching now, following in my humble footsteps. Ten years ago, he thought I was quite mad to waste myself on children.

  Scoffed Moore, Now people think the same of him.

  Be nice, intoned Dorothy, lowering her eyes.

  I am being nice, protested Moore. But between you and me, I don’t know how he stands it at his age — having all those children underfoot. And from what I understand, Bertie has some wild little Indians. Glancing at Dorothy, he said, I told you Hawney stopped there last year. Moore smiled in anticipation, then said to Wittgenstein, Hawney’s a don at King’s, a historian of some merit. At any rate, Hawney hadn’t been there an hour when he saw one boy push another down a flight of stairs. Bertie told him that was nothing — why, the month before a girl had put a needle in her little brother’s soup, then sat there giggling while the little fellow choked.

  Oh, quit! protested Dorothy, making a face. You know Hawney hates children.

  Oh, does he now? Well, one day Hawney and Bertie are sitting outside when they hear the most dreadful caterwauling. So they run round the house, and there they see a little girl tied to a tree, just screaming her heart out while the other children are busily piling rubbish and sticks around her. Bertie nearly fell over. Oh, she’s Joan of Arc, said a little boy. Hawney said Bertie was fit to be tied himself. As they were freeing the girl, Bertie turned to him and said, What am I to do — suspend the teaching of history? Can you imagine if we taught the Spanish Inquisition?

  Wittgenstein and this Max were staring at Moore with looks of stern disapproval. Max said, This is not good. The children must have order, always. In Ludwig’s school, always there was good order.

  Oh? Moore looked at him, bemused. It was extraordinary, to hear this profuse, unrestrained man speak of order.

  Eyeing Max with displeasure, Wittgenstein said, I was firm. The children knew what I would tolerate and what I would not. But there is certainly a good deal more to teaching than keeping order.

  Indeed so, said Moore with a mischievous nod. Peering over the rims of his glasses, Moore then remarked, Well, I do hope the children are clothed when we arrive.

  Oh, go on, said Dorothy, giving him a little nudge with her shoulder.

  But it’s true! Moore insisted. Hawney said Bertie lets the children run about like little aborigines when it’s hot. I’m dead in earnest, said Moore, peeping delightedly around the company. Apparently, the local parson and his wife live nearby. Hawney says the children will saunter over to the parsonage to be fed milk and cookies. Oh, just as pretty as you please, they come, and, mind you, not one stitch! The parson and his wife are very good about it, I understand. I suppose they view themselves as missionaries. But it does aggravate Bertie terribly, the religious ideas the children bring back. Hawney says the children are rather fonder of Demeter and fairies than Jesus anyhow.

  Now Max was shaking his head in vigorous disapproval, and Wittgenstein was picking a piece of lint from his trousers with a distinct air of distaste. Unable to resist, Moore went on:

  I heard another tale, you know. Sucking in his cheeks in anticipation as they looked up, Moore said, Well, when Bertie first opened the school, the parson naturally stopped by to offer his greetings. So he knocked on the door, and when it opened, he saw a little girl. And, lo and behold — Moore slapped his forehead — the child was stark naked. Good God! exclaimed the parson. To which the little girl replied, There is no God, and slammed the door in his face.

  Wittgenstein laughed with surprise at this, but not Max. Folding his arms in disgust, Max didn’t say another word for ten minutes — a long time for him.

  Moore, meanwhile, was getting curious. Normally he was not one to pry, but finally, a bit anxiously, he asked Max to divulge what, in England, is considered a somewhat private matter. Moore asked the young German what kind of work he did. An innocent question. A natural question. Max thought nothing of it, and without a hint of humor or irony he replied:

  God’s work.

  But there was a question that Moore and Dorothy did not ask. It was about the cane.

  Sensing their curiosity, Max said, Ludwig’s stick? You wonder why for is the stick?

  Cane, corrected Wittgenstein. I acquired it while I was teaching. Then, with a look at Max, he added, To use as a pointer, not a rod.

  Injected Dorothy with a note of relief, Oh, then your legs are all right? I thought it might have been something from the war.

  No, no. Wittgenstein brushed this off. I bought it in Vienna one Christmas — 1922, I believe. Quite on impulse.

  Sure, cut in Max. To stick at me, with his stick. When Ludwig is angry he pointed at me this stick.

  Cane, corrected Wittgenstein again. And not to point. To punctuate. To punctuate a point.

  This is so, huh? asked Max, defiantly dropping his jaw with a crazy gleam in his eyes. To puncture — to puncture me he pointed, see? Like the motorcar’s wheel to puncture, so?

  Not wheel — tire.

  Wheel, tire — the same. Ludwig don’t think I will know this word “punctures,” Dorthe. And so I learn good your words, Ludwig. Puncture Max with your stick, so?

  Cane.

  Cane, stick, wheel. The same. The same.

  Later, Max took down his pack and started rummaging through
it. Moore and Dorothy could not help looking at what was clearly the kit of a seasoned traveler. It was a military pack, stitched and restitched and attached to a homemade wooden frame webbed with strong jute cord and canvas fixed with brass sailing grommets. On the top flap of the pack was a hand-drawn cross, runed and black, like a crusader’s cross or the German Iron Cross. Inside, all was as meticulously and economically laid out as an apothecary’s cove: fishhooks and other things in watertight bottles, coiled rope and canvas, candles and matches, a sheath knife and hatchet, spare clothes. Max withdrew a book wrapped in oilcloth and proceeded to unwrap it with all the ritualistic care of a man who owns only a few essential things. Even before he untied the string they knew it was a Bible. It, too, had been through a war, and looked it. Battered and mildew spotted, it had a greasy handmade cover made of tallow-hardened sailcloth marked with another black and clotted cross. It was a labor itself, that book. As Max opened it, they could see pages blackened with heavy underlining and spiraling notes in German — indictments written in a heated hand. Seeing that part of the book had been torn away, Dorothy Moore said: